Horsetail Falls Hike

Pyramid Creek Flowing over Rocks

This year's hike on my annual trip to Lake Tahoe was the Horsetail Falls hike. I didn't choose this hike but I'm glad my friends did. It was a hike I had never been on before and for the most part was quite pleasant. Our goal was to walk to the base of Horsetail Falls. The reviews of this hike said that the hike to the top of the falls was difficult and took an extra hour each way. I was hiking with my friends and their families, with kids ranging in age from 12 to 19.

Water rushing down rocks

 The trail follows the Pyramid Creek, which if were in my home town would be called a raging river! Even with a low snowfall year, the creek was running swiftly in mid-July. The creek creates lots of small waterfalls as it flows down the mountain. In some spots the flow is slower and makes a perfect pond for the younger ones to swim in and cool off. I did not go it the water, just filled my hat with water and put it back on my head to cool off as the temperature was getting close to 90 degrees.

Me Standing Funny

The trail wasn't too crowded, but the a parking lot was full, as we were warned by the reviews of the hike. We ended up parking across the highway off a dirt road. Not sure if that was legal, but none of our cars got tickets, or worse, towed.

More flowing water

 The hike was about half in the shade of trees and half out in the open. The parts of the trail near the creek were nice, but the exposed sections were mostly over granite rock and sometimes the trail was hard to find. Hiking down was even more difficult because we took the second half of the loop back at the Desolation Wilderness sign.

Horsetail Falls

We never made it to the base of Horsetail Falls. We had our fill of hiking and had to get back to South Lake Tahoe for burgers at Izzy's. The photo above is zoomed-in. The trail from where I took the photo got even more ambiguous and hard to follow. I was doing this hike alone or with other adventurous hikers I would have gone further up and maybe with more time all the way up to the top. That will be a hike for another day, as well as summiting Mt. Rose and Tallac Mountain.